-Caveat Lector-
A little more information on how our government treats its citizens. I've
been following this case for years, and the harrassment of the innocent only
becomes more egregious. Prudy
VIN SUPRYNOWICZ
MORE COLUMNS
Sunday, September 02, 2001
Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal
COLUMN: Boy, do they ever want Trails End Ranch
Boy, do they ever want Trails End Ranch
The Donald Scott case isn't as well known as the government atrocities at
Waco and Ruby Ridge. But it should be.
In October of 1992, millionaire recluse Donald Scott and his bride of two
months, Frances Plante Scott, lived in a storybook wooded valley in the
mountains high above Malibu, Calif. Trails End Ranch is almost completely
surrounded by state and federal park land, and the neighboring government
entities had made numerous attempts to buy out Scott and annex his property.
Frances Scott contends the National Security Agency and NASA's Jet Propulsion
Laboratories have also had a less-well-known role in the attempted government
land grab -- the ranch sits in the midst of a government antenna array,
perfectly sited to receive data from the Pacific Missile Test Range, and, "My
husband was the only local resident to testify against the placement of those
antennas."
Stymied in their attempt to buy the Scott ranch, government officials hit on
an alternative plan. Contending an officer had seen "marijuana plants growing
under the trees" during a drug-seeking overflight, agents from various
jurisdictions gathered quietly outside the locked gate to the ranch in the
morning mists of Oct. 2, 1992. After greedily studying the maps of the 200
acres of prime land they were told they'd be able to grab under federal asset
seizure laws should they find as few as 14 marijuana plants, they cut the
chain on the gate with bolt-cutters and raced a mile up the dirt drive to the
ranch, complete with police dogs.
Frances Scott was in the kitchen, brewing her morning coffee, when dozens of
men in plainclothes and brandishing guns -- no badges or warrants in evidence
-- came swarming in. Understandably, she screamed for her husband, still
asleep upstairs.
Donald Scott, 63, came hurrying down the stairs, a handgun held over his
head. The officers shouted for him to lower his weapon. He did. They shot him
dead.
Frances Scott contends the photograph of two plainclothes cops displayed at
her web site, www.savetrailsend.org, was taken mere minutes after her
husband's death. The two officers wear grins of triumph.
Ventura County District Attorney Michael Bradbury, after a six-month
investigation, concluded a voluminous report
(www.savetrailsend.org/report.shtml) by branding the fatal raid "a land grab
by the [L.A.] Sheriffs Office." He confirms the odd fact that "Two
researchers from Jet Propulsion Laboratories (JPL) in Pasadena" were also
present for the so-called drug raid, and asks in his conclusion, "Did the Los
Angeles County Sheriff obtain the warrant in order to obtain Scott's land?
Did the National Park Service orchestrate the investigation or killing in
order to obtain the land?"
Not a single marijuana seed or stem was ever found: "All they had to show for
their trouble was this body on the living room floor," reported the Los
Angeles Times.
The multiple government agencies settled a wrongful death suit for $5
million.
One would think that would leave Trails End Ranch securely in the hands of
the widow Scott, who has made it her life's work to see the government never
gets the property. But if one assumed that, one would not be properly
accounting for the creativity and plain, cussed persistence of today's
government land thieves.
A year after the raid and shooting, the widow Scott had to stand alongside 15
local firefighters and watch as the main house, cabins and other outbuildings
of Trail's End Ranch burned to the ground. She says a county firefighter told
her with tears in his eyes that a National Parks spokesman denied the firemen
permission to dig a firebreak, since, "It violates our rules to disturb the
natural beauty of the land."
Many would have expected Mrs. Scott to depart after being burned out of house
and home. Instead, she's spent the past six years camped out on the property
in a teepee. Mrs. Scott's current problem? The ranch went to Donald Scott's
estate, of which she controls only a minority share, the rest going to his
children by a previous marriage. The IRS appraises the ranch at $2.4 million,
and wants inheritance tax on $1 million of that sum, at 55 percent.
The attorneys for the children have advised them the ranch would be hard to
market -- the official appraisal describes it as inaccessible, though Mrs.
Scott says the mile-long access road is still perfectly functional -- and
that they'll be better off selling the property to pay the taxes.
Thus, on Aug. 2, a police SWAT team accompanied by two helicopters arrived to
evict Mrs. Scott.
Out of the $5 million wrongful death settlement, 40 percent went to the
lawyers off the top, while the rest was split six ways. Once Mrs. Scott paid
off her own eight years worth of legal bills, that left her barely enough to
offer a $170,000 down payment to back her $1.95 million bid for the ranch in
the upcoming tax auction, she says.
But now, "The lawyers have kept my $170,000 down payment for potential
damages. ... I won't have a single dollar to take to this auction, so the
National Park Service will be the only party to place a bid," Mrs. Scott told
me last week.
The widow Scott has paid out at least another $55,000 to a series of three
backers who agreed to bid on the ranch in her behalf, but each has been
raided or otherwise intimidated by local police and the FBI, she contends.
No officers were ever charged in Donald Scott's death, of course. Police are
rarely charged with murdering mere civilians, any more, in this Land of the
Free.
Mrs. Scott invites those wishing to "help save Trails End Ranch" to
contribute to the Donald Scott Memorial Fund, P.O. Box 6755 Malibu, CA 90264,
or c/o Bank of America, Point Dume Branch, 29171 Heather Cliff Road, Malibu,
CA 90264, (tel.) 310-456-6296.
Vin Suprynowicz, the Review-Journal's assistant editorial page editor, is
author of "Send in the Waco Killers." His column appears Sunday.
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